May Goodness

We decided to take Max along to the library story time.  After testing out the program the week before, we thought it would be appropriate for him to tag along.  He doesn’t always get to go everywhere with us since he can be a little rotten sometimes.  haha

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Reagan had the opportunity to read a story aloud to the group.  Although most of the kids just continued playing, it was a good experience for her.

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Here’s a short clip of her reading at storytime…

Max at his allergy checkup.  He kept pointing to all his bruises and scratches and saying “Dr. fix it! Dr. fix it!”

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Here he is hiding from the Dr.

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Dipping strawberries in chocolate at Gran’s-

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A picture for Uncle Jared-

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Nightly reading with Rea-

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Rolling down the hill at Gran & Papaw’s

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 Our early Thursday morning travel time to Knoxville-  They were singing “Trading My Sorrows” with Uncle Jared on cd!

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I really enjoyed my one-on-one time with Emmy every Thursday this past school year.  We had lots of special experiences including zoo trips with dip n dots!

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Emmy doing her thing at The Little Gym.

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A quick clip from her class-

Emmy loves putting on her own lipstick.  She has got pretty good at it!

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Gran’s glasses-

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Playing at the baseball field during the girls’ game.

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Dogs interested in Reagan’s mathwork-

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It has been said that I could do my own book on Max and all the crazy ways he has fell asleep!  Here he is with a flashlight.

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Selfie-

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Emmy with Mr. Giggles at post-church Burger King stop…

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Some books Rea read from the library-

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I took the dogs to the vet by myself.  Crazy me.  Dixie was trying to put her head out my sunroof- which took me right back to college days with my dog Gracie.  Anyone that knew me during college probably still has the vision of me driving my camry with Gracie coming out of the sunroof.

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Emmy stays the night with my parents a lot.  My dad brought her home one morning.  I cracked up when I saw what she was wearing.  Her favorite white dress and black tank at the same time!!  Oh, this girl and her fashion!

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An interesting find in Gran & Papaw’s yard-

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The kids “helped” put out tomato plants.

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Emmy was trying to run over Max.  Priceless.

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This little bird was just learning to fly (we think).  It landed on this post for just a minute so we got to see it up close!

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“What is Fruit?  Fruit is food.  Fruit is also for animals.  Which is the healthiest?  It is a apple.”

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Rea slicked down Max’s hair.

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Zoo trip-

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Max’s 3 year check up-

Oh boy.  This boy.  I took him in for his 3 year check up.  He of course was covered with bruises and scratches because he is the wildest 3 year old dude out there.  The dr. came in and began to ask him questions like-

Do you know your whole name?  Max replied, “Maxie”.

How old are you?  Are you one?  Max replied, “I’m one.” (holding up one finger).

Are you two? Max replied, “I’m two.” (adding another finger to make two).

No, you’re not two.  Are you three? He said, “I’m three.” (adding another finger to make three).

Are you a boy or a girl?  He smoothly replied, “A girl.”

I quickly intervened by asking, “I hope this isn’t a test we really need to pass???” haha The Dr. just laughed and didn’t seem too worried about it.

He did really well on all the active test the Dr. asked him to perform (hopping on one foot, walking on tiptoes, etc.).

This little guy really stretches me in ways that I thought I couldn’t stretch as a mom.  I know this is probably just a taste of what’s to come.  But seriously, he is a “corker” as I imagine my Mamaw Peggy might say if she were still here.

He can be every bit as sweet as he is rotten.  Those sweet moments keep me wrapped around his finger.

He was 70% on his height and 50 % on his weight.

He got his finger poked (for blood work) and one shot.  He didn’t cry or whine for either of them.  TOUGH boy.

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Funny clips from the Dr.’s office-

Our last rental car (my car was in the shop again for AC!)-  We appropriately named this the Cool Cucumber.

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Our growing, home-made chia pets from the library program-

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Reagan lost her 5th tooth in her sleep!  We couldn’t find it anywhere!  The tooth fairy still brought her some $ even though the tooth was gone.

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These two seem like twins to me sometimes.

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Working on Mother’s Day gifts for all the special ladies in our family-

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No breakfast in bed for me on Mother’s Day!  This is what I woke up to.  haha

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I used the family recipe for Strawberry Shortcakes to make these up for Mother’s Day lunch.

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Me and my mom on Mother’s Day!

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Emmy in her other favorite dress/skirt.  She wore this dress for at least 7 days straight.

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My Mother’s Day gift.  Daniel restored our porch swing to better condition!  This is the swing that I grew up with at my Mamaw’s house.  So I was really happy that he went to the trouble to do this for me.  He let the girls add some color to it, too.

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I asked the girls to go get dressed for Sunday night service at church.  This is what I get.  Maybe they’re not quite ready for the responsibility for dressing themselves for church.

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Week 11, All Things Fall cont.

Looking back, October was a pretty busy and “packed full” month for us! This post is for the 3rd week of Oct.!

Here’s a sweet goodnight message we sent to Uncle Jared one night- (turn off blog music on right sidebar before playing video)

No better way to start off a week than to cover yourself in Hello Kitty tattoos!

A stop by my photography studio provided Emmy with the perfect setting for her photoshoot.  She set this shot up by herself!

We did our monthly visit at the LaFollette Nursing Home.  Emmy signed herself in as a visitor-

I was starting to “itch” to put up a Christmas tree.  We decided to do the playroom tree and decorate it will fall stuff.  It was a lovely idea!  Even Max got in on hanging pumpkin ornaments!

Tuesday morning storytime at the library-  I loved that the story was on apples!  It’s nice when everything seems to work together with what we’re learning at home.

Kay Kay tagged along with us on our Tuesday adventures.  Here they are at the park for our woods loop (aka spooky trail) walk.

We had our regular visit to the animal shelter.  This day we photographed “Maggie”- a black lab female mix.  I really liked her and started to persuade myself to adopt her!  Of course, Daniel wasn’t too fond of the idea…

More backyard reading-

I had the girls use acorns as manipulatives for doing some adding.  Reagan tried to explain the concept of adding to Emmy.  I actually videoed it (but then lost it when my iphone got wet!).  It was so sweet.  At the end, Reagan said, “See mom, I am going to teach my kids like you teach us.  I’ll be a good mother like you!”  🙂

We have been working on some word families.  Here are all of her “at” words.

Matching Uppercase to Lowercase letters…..

More bathtub sleeping!  I can’t blame them… they come by this honestly.  I remember doing this even in high school.  (lol embarassing, right?)

This girl likes her lipstick!

  Emmy & I took Rea a baked potato for her lunch at Thursday Connection.  Reagan used her own money to buy Emmy a sucker from the concession stand.

In her art class, she finished up her “Clay Leaves Fired with Crystal Ceramic Overglazes”

Emmy at The Little Gym-

There is a neat playground/outside area at the Thursday Connection location.  Emmy always enjoys playing for a little bit while we wait for Reagan to get out of class!

We made a stop by the Young-Williams Animal Center in Knoxville.  Here’s the girls in the “Cat Room”!  They loved it!  I didn’t think I was going to get them out of there.

And we actually made a 2nd visit to the animal shelter that week TO ADOPT MAGGIE.  I just couldn’t bear the thoughts of her not being adopted and getting put down.  She looks like she belongs in our family, right?

First day of playing with her new sis Dixie!

“Finding the Chunks”-   I give Rea a list of words and we find familiar “chunks” in each word.  It is a decoding strategy that helps her to break down and read words quicker.

Emmy doing a little writing of her own-

It seemed like a nice fit-

The first couple nights, the kids each went to sleep cuddling with Maggie!  She is a pretty sweet girl.

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Week 10, Apples, Pumpkins, & All Things Fall

Well, here goes nothing!  I am SO behind on blogging which makes me sad since I was doing such a good job keeping everything up to date.  I had dropped my iphone in water and lost several pictures and videos (thank goodness for Instagram!) and then jumped right into my busiest season for my photography business.  I had to prioritize and personal blogging fell low on my list.  So, I’m back again to pick up the pieces where I left off and keep trudging along!  (This post is from the second week of Oct. 2012.)

One of the many reasons that Emmy would rather be at Gran & Papaw’s house…

Our regular Tuesday trip to the Caryville Public Library Storytime…

A walk at the park (chilly day) to collect leaves…

Our weekly visit to the Animal Shelter-

This little frog was taking my blood pressure in this picture.

We used our leaves from the park to talk about the parts of a plant and their functions.

We also used some to decorate the playroom-

And this date is one to go down in Stanfill history (10.16.12)-  “the day Emmy cut her own hair”!  We had all been in the playroom working on activities when I had to step upstairs for a moment (LITERALLY, Just, ONLY a moment).  When I returned, I quickly noticed first some clippings of hair in the floor and then next the green handled children’s scissors close by.  THEN, I noticed that chunks of Emmy’s beautiful hair style were missing.  It quickly went downhill from there.  Here she is after she cried herself to sleep in time-out.  Did I over-react?  Possibly.  Probably.  But at the time, I felt so mad at her for doing something that I had preached about not doing on several occasions.

No, her hair isn’t behind her ear here!  It is long gone.  A nice chunk, right?

She also cut some other chunks leaving some sections of pretty short hair.

Here we are on the way to the salon to get it “fixed”.  The guilt had set in by this point- she didn’t want to look at me for the picture!

Yep, Emmy had to do what I would imagine might be a child’s “Walk of Shame” through the salon door and into the chair.  She had her little pink leotard/dance costume on and marched right in.

She was feeling happier about herself after leaving the salon.  She later confessed that she wanted “to cut her hair like Megan does”.

Next day—-Puppet show- Emmy’s babies also attended (see them lined up on hopscotch rug?)…

Aunt Kay arrived for her visit to TN.  The kids were SOOOO happy to see her.  It was sweet to watch them greet her!

Here’s a video of the homecoming!  (Make sure you turn off blog music on right sidebar before playing!)  I would have lost this video altogether, but had thankfully sent it to my brother!  He was able to send it back to me.  It is lower resolution than the original version, but at least I still have it!

SuperMax crashes-

Here’s Reagan practicing her sight words.  I have a list of them written out in this spiral-bound index card notebook.  She gets to flip through the pages and add a sticker when she reads the word correctly.

Reagan’s writing-  She likes to write about cats and things that are red since she can spell “red” and “cat”! haha

Emmy had a “photo shoot” with my iphone and this baby and cat.  I had about 30 images (at least) that looked just like this one on my phone.

We enjoyed this pumpkin life cycle activity.

We graphed our family members’ favorite color of apple.  It was a fun, hands-on lesson!

We visited the local pumpkin patch and enjoyed their special activities.

Papaw Clear tagged along with us.  He thought the whole concept of the Pumpkin Patch and Corn Maze was pretty amazing.

They came home to strawberry-dipping fun at Papaw & Gran’s.  YUM!

Reagan’s weekly artwork from Thursday Connection-

Here’s some end-of-the-week Dixie love and reading in the backyard!

We attended the Shriner’s Circus in Knoxville.  It has become a yearly tradition.  The kids had a great time!

I love this Sunday morning tub shot!  Max’s smile just says it all!

He was zapped after our Church homecoming.  He wouldn’t let me take his hat or tie off for his nap!

And late Sunday night, pillow case sleeping bags…

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Week 4, Nursery Rhymes

This was a short week for us because we left on Thursday night for the beach.  So once you take out one day for Thursday Connection and half a day for the library program/animal shelter, we had about 2.5 days worth home school activities left to do at home.

Here they are at the Caryville Public Library working on a post-story time activity.

Rea’s trip to the shelter was fun this week.  There were two new litters of pups so she, of course, was drawn to them especially.  We got to help someone take pictures of one litter of the puppies for a rescue website.  That was fun!

And we loved this cat!  It was beautiful and so calm.  I was pretty close to talking myself into bringing it home to live in the backyard, but then I snapped back to reality.  haha  But this was a sweet kitty- probably one of my favorites since we’ve been visiting the shelter.

Everytime that I upload my iphone pictures to my computer, it is a treat to see the random shots that the kids have taken that I didn’t know about.  Here’s one I found that I assume Emmy took.  Reagan and I were working on the daily message.

The girls worked on a letter to Aunt Kay!

Here’s Reagan doing a word sort (the, they, this, that).  She likes doing these!  She has had a little trouble when reading sight words distinguishing quickly between these words so I thought this might help give her some extra practice.  Oh yeah, see the tornado that swept though in the background.  People often ask what Emmy and Max do during home school.  Here is a good clue!!

I found the neatest printable nursery rhyme pages at this website – Kindergarten Nana.  She has lots of neat ideas and activities on her blog.  We just filled in Reagan’s name and pasted her picture on every little open face.  It was great!!  Emmy made one, too.

Humpty Dumpty illustrated through construction paper-

Here’s the stories we read throughout this week!  Even though they haven’t always made a lot of sense to me (haha), Reagan has always enjoyed listening to nursery rhymes.  They are quick, easy reads and the rhyming makes it more enjoyable.

And here’s one the last rhymes we read of the week!  (made me sad!!)

Here she is enjoying her lunchtime in the cafeteria at Thursday Connection.  I had to volunteer on campus that day so I enjoyed being able to sneak and check on her.

And finally, her art piece from the week- “Circle Circus”

 

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